Increasingly, science centers and museums count on information technology (IT) to do everything from back-office support to database mining. Discussion topics at this RAP included open-source software, e-commerce, ticketing, Linux operating systems, interactive kiosks, wireless networks, and other uses of IT on the exhibit floor.

Contact: Brian Tonner, CEO, 407/514-2012

March 12–13
Designing and sustaining a fee-based afterschool programExploris, Raleigh, North Carolina

RAP participants observed Exploris’s afterschool program for middle school students and discussed budgets, staffing, programming for different age groups, food, marketing, and community involvement.

This first European RAP, co-sponsored by ECSITE, focused on outreach that uses easy-to-transport exhibits carried in science trucks, science vans, science buses, and even science boats. Participants shared experiences with launching an MEP, staffing and budgets, and marketing and target groups, and traded ideas about benefits of MEPs, evaluations, and what makes for a successful project.

Contact: Patricia Verheyden, Manager of Exhibits

June 10–11
Exhibits and expansion in the 21st century
Liberty Science Center, Jersey City, New Jersey

How do new philosophies of management, technology, and mission influence the way we think about exhibits and change our process for planning facility expansions? Participants discussed the new interplay of exhibit development, design, and implementation with other expansion efforts, such as architecture, construction, infrastructure, facility closures, education, marketing, and fund-raising. Session leaders from three institutions in the New Jersey/New York City area, each at a different phase in the expansion process, shared recent events and lessons.

RMSC’s summer camp programs have not only served the community well, but been a reliable revenue source. Topics of this RAP included institutional buy-in, programming, staff recruitment, marketing, and assessment. Participants shared stories, photographs, marketing materials, and schedules.

Recent News

About 800,000 Americans are now furloughed from their jobs working for the Federal government, and several science centers and museums have implemented free-admission programs and events to help government workers and the families maintain access to science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) learning opportunities. With community members in nearly every U.S. city facing paycheck losses, […]